4 ms·

> Los Angeles, San Francisco/San Jose, Dallas, Phoenix -- could be (and should be) a global metropolises Yes! > with a populations and cultural relevance riva

by zamfi 3y ago

> Los Angeles, San Francisco/San Jose, Dallas, Phoenix -- could be (and should be) a global metropolises Yes! > with a populations and cultural relevance rivaling Tokyo or Hong Kong. YES! > They would be, if not for the car. ...what? They are not because their local governments prohibit construction and actively oppose growth, which is only vaguely related to the car. Approximately zero "global metropolises" have single-family zoning in 95% of their inner core land area. Not "have single family homes", sure maybe Tokyo has that. But zoning that prohibits denser development in such a way that most (yes, most) current housing in those areas is too dense to be built today under current rules. (This last part is true even of NYC.) The US went hardcore anti-density in the 70s. And sure, that has something to do with the car.

nine_k 3y ago
In the 1970s, beside the prevalence of cars, there were two more factors hollowing out cities: "white flight" and the fear of a nuclear war. A nuke hitting Manhattan would certainly affect more people that a nuke hitting some suburbia, and why would a nuke be targeted there in the first place? The fear was real :(
mlsu 3y ago
I think we agree. But the car is a much bigger part of it than you're letting on. The reason we zone this way is because people are unable to imagine their lives without being able to drive around. The very first thing people say in my town when an apartment tower goes up is "where am I going to park? Do they have a plan for moving the parking spots that this tower displaced? Traffic on tower St. is going to get so much worse!" If the expectation is that everyone owns a car, upzoning is a huge problem -- it actually is, because everything that scares a car brain ("I can't park!" "It's going to be loud!" "This will increase traffic!") is actually true. Rather than limiting cars, of course, we choose to limit zoning. Which is actually quite a logical thing to do if everyone is to own a car. If you get rid of cars you get rid of collectors, arterials, onramps and offramps, turn lanes, parking spots... Those are things that are fundamentally incompatible with a major, dense, vibrant city. You can easily fit 50,000 people, their workplaces, senior care homes, schools, and restaurants into the land area of a 4 way cloverleaf that is designed to service 50,000 round trip commutes by car.
- snapplebobapple 3y ago
  It's not even the car that is the problem. It's the lack of viable alternatives to the car. In my city in North America there are almost 1.5 million people, I live about 4 kms from the city center and it's extremely uncomfortable without a car, even though I live on multiple bus and one LRT line within ten minutes of walking. I purposefully bought and built where I am because of all this connectivity, maybe 5 % of the whole city has it as good as I do, the rest have it worse to much worse. I basically live in the best situation in the city for alternatives and it's worse than the crappiest parts of the city for alternative sin places like the Netherlands. To make alternatives you can look at what the Netherlands does. They have much more relaxed lot coverage, height limits, parking requirements, etc. so they get the same single family square footage in way less geographic area and they intermix that with much higher density so their cities proper are 3-4 times denser than where I live while not feeling cramped. They didn't get rid of the car, what they did do was ensure people had great walking, biking and transit options to fulfill the normal trips that make up their lives. That is vs where I live where I am fine getting downtown with transit, but to my kids schools, groceries, or any other workplace outside of the core, I am screwed. The extra density makes providing these transit options possible (along with reasonable regulation on other areas leading to reasonable density)
- zamfi 3y ago
  Yeah, all this is the stated argument here. But in the US, at least, the underlying argument is about class, and race. If you haven't already, it might be worth reading about redlining, the historical practice of outlining which neighborhoods were "safe" to issue mortgage loans in because they were white and not at risk of non-whites moving in. This was about race, primarily. Redlining became illegal starting in the '70s in many places, and its replacement was exclusionary zoning---a practice that continues to this day that relies instead on race's strong correlate, wealth. Apartments and other similar higher-density arrangements are much more affordable--and as a result, accessible to racial minorities (and the crime, etc. that racial minorities were "associated" with). All the modern arguments around traffic jams, neighborhood character, transit, etc.---these are all modern-day variants of the same old arguments, because again, who can afford a 1:1 ratio of cars to people-in-household to get around the low-density suburbs? So when you hear people say "I can't park! It'll be loud!" consider if they're really saying "I don't want those other people who rely on transit in my neighborhood", but using the words "there won't be room for me to park!"

by zamfi 3y ago

nine_k 3y ago

In the 1970s, beside the prevalence of cars, there were two more factors hollowing out cities: "white flight" and the fear of a nuclear war. A nuke hitting Manhattan would certainly affect more people that a nuke hitting some suburbia, and why would a nuke be targeted there in the first place? The fear was real :(

mlsu 3y ago

I think we agree. But the car is a much bigger part of it than you're letting on. The reason we zone this way is because people are unable to imagine their lives without being able to drive around. The very first thing people say in my town when an apartment tower goes up is "where am I going to park? Do they have a plan for moving the parking spots that this tower displaced? Traffic on tower St. is going to get so much worse!" If the expectation is that everyone owns a car, upzoning is a huge problem -- it actually is, because everything that scares a car brain ("I can't park!" "It's going to be loud!" "This will increase traffic!") is actually true. Rather than limiting cars, of course, we choose to limit zoning. Which is actually quite a logical thing to do if everyone is to own a car. If you get rid of cars you get rid of collectors, arterials, onramps and offramps, turn lanes, parking spots... Those are things that are fundamentally incompatible with a major, dense, vibrant city. You can easily fit 50,000 people, their workplaces, senior care homes, schools, and restaurants into the land area of a 4 way cloverleaf that is designed to service 50,000 round trip commutes by car.

snapplebobapple 3y ago
It's not even the car that is the problem. It's the lack of viable alternatives to the car. In my city in North America there are almost 1.5 million people, I live about 4 kms from the city center and it's extremely uncomfortable without a car, even though I live on multiple bus and one LRT line within ten minutes of walking. I purposefully bought and built where I am because of all this connectivity, maybe 5 % of the whole city has it as good as I do, the rest have it worse to much worse. I basically live in the best situation in the city for alternatives and it's worse than the crappiest parts of the city for alternative sin places like the Netherlands. To make alternatives you can look at what the Netherlands does. They have much more relaxed lot coverage, height limits, parking requirements, etc. so they get the same single family square footage in way less geographic area and they intermix that with much higher density so their cities proper are 3-4 times denser than where I live while not feeling cramped. They didn't get rid of the car, what they did do was ensure people had great walking, biking and transit options to fulfill the normal trips that make up their lives. That is vs where I live where I am fine getting downtown with transit, but to my kids schools, groceries, or any other workplace outside of the core, I am screwed. The extra density makes providing these transit options possible (along with reasonable regulation on other areas leading to reasonable density)
zamfi 3y ago
Yeah, all this is the stated argument here. But in the US, at least, the underlying argument is about class, and race. If you haven't already, it might be worth reading about redlining, the historical practice of outlining which neighborhoods were "safe" to issue mortgage loans in because they were white and not at risk of non-whites moving in. This was about race, primarily. Redlining became illegal starting in the '70s in many places, and its replacement was exclusionary zoning---a practice that continues to this day that relies instead on race's strong correlate, wealth. Apartments and other similar higher-density arrangements are much more affordable--and as a result, accessible to racial minorities (and the crime, etc. that racial minorities were "associated" with). All the modern arguments around traffic jams, neighborhood character, transit, etc.---these are all modern-day variants of the same old arguments, because again, who can afford a 1:1 ratio of cars to people-in-household to get around the low-density suburbs? So when you hear people say "I can't park! It'll be loud!" consider if they're really saying "I don't want those other people who rely on transit in my neighborhood", but using the words "there won't be room for me to park!"